The Mitchell Area Development Corporation has accepted a local offer for the former Happy Chef building in Mitchell and hopes to close on the property in January.
MADC Executive Director Bryan Hisel said that while the deal is not done, an offer has been accepted and the prospective buyer has 60 days to finalize a deal. Four offers for the property were received prior to the Dec. 1 offer deadline.
Hisel said he would wait until the sale closes to reveal the potential buyer and the amount of the offer, out of respect for the interested parties or in case the purchase falls through.
The property is located at 1620 S. Burr St., located near the intersection of State Highway 37 and Interstate 90. It includes a vacant restaurant and 1-acre lot that was formerly home to Kinder's Great Eats and Happy Chef. The development corporation has owned the building since 2010.
Two of the offers were from Mitchell-based buyers, one was from elsewhere in South Dakota and another offer was from out-of-state, Hisel said. The prospective buyer has put the minimum 10 percent down on the property, which was one of the terms of the sale.
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Hisel said the property is on one of the most visible corners in the city of Mitchell, which has been a key part of generating interest in the property.
"We're excited about the development potential that is possible here," Hisel said this week. "It's at the due diligence stage right now for the buyers."
The property had an appraised value of $480,000. MADC purchased the building in 2010 for $350,000, when the former owner of the building gifted a portion of the costs and reduced the purchase price.
For the lead offer, Hisel said the buyer would like to place a new commercial building on the property and have at least one business in that facility. He said the buyer has plans to keep a visitors center on site. All four offers MADC received expressed an interest in building a new building on the site and having a new, larger visitors center on the property.
"We are likely going to get a bigger and better visitors center on the site, and that's a good thing for the community," Hisel said. "It's always been a great site, but the building has probably been a little modest in the way it represents Mitchell."
The buyers were interested in a visitors center because it would be a traffic generator for their potential businesses at the site.
The MADC had plans to either renovate or demolish the 1970 building and build a new, larger visitors center until the costs of the project -- more than $600,000 -- made it no longer cost effective.
